I've loved Nutella (that gooey, sickly sweet cocoa and hazelnut spread) since I was about 6 and while I was recently trawling the shops at Changi Airport, killing time before boarding, I saw this very handsome package of midnight-blue-foil wrapped chocolate nuggets that had me at, well.... "Hello". What sealed the deal was the insane (I am now breathing in lungfuls of the remnants of that ravaged package) chocolate and hazelnut aroma that managed to escape the packaging and the fact that it was going for 50% off the usual price of SGD 29.95.

As I bit into that first upturned canoe shaped morsel, I had no idea of the pedigree of Caffarel, whose name is chocolate royalty in Italy. The Caffarel family invented Gianduia (chocolate hazelnut praline) when the protracted Napoleonic Wars caused a severe cocoa shortage and Pierre Paul Caffarel decided to stretch his limited supply of precious cocoa with finely ground Piedmontese hazelnuts, still considered the most exqusite in all of Italy. The rest is gastronomic history.

The chocolate more than delivered on the whispered promise of its lusciously rich aroma and rewarded my good faith with a flavour that almost had me whimpering, and a texture that I can only describe as alabaster smooth and butter rich. This, I imagine, is what every jar of Nutella secretly wants to be, when it grows up.

Priced at SGD 29.95 for a 250 g (8.8 oz) pack at Choco Fantasia (Changi Airport T2, #026-079, Departure/Transit Lounge). Also available here, with the possibility of delivery outside the EU.